QUESTION: Federal Funding for Solitary Confinement

question / pregunta: 

I'm looking into the Pennyslvania Dept. of Corrections use of 'restricted housing units.' I am particularly interested in founding out where funding for them comes from, and if this includes founding from the Federal government. Publicly-available information doesn't seem to disaggregated founding sources, and there is less public-available specifics on the Dept. of Corrections Budget. So far most of my research has been from the 'state-side'

So, my questions is if there is a precedent for federal funding for 'restricted housing units' or solitary confinement coming from the Federal Government?

Answers

Hi,

Four of us have now tried and failed to find evidence of federal funding for solitary confinement/restricted housing units in Pennsylvania prisons.

I did find an article about federal funding for a study attempting to debunk the idea that solitary confinement is bad for prison inmates.

Questioning study that showed inmates in solitary get better
By Susan Greene
November 7, 2010.

Some thoughts on your question for Radical Reference

Hi Crusher,
Many of us have been trying to answer this question, but we're coming up against a wall. Some thoughts:

1. From what I can tell from DOJ and the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections website, the budget information isn't broken down the way you'd like it to be. Broadly speaking, federal prisons are funded by the feds, state prisons by the state, and city/local/municipal confinement facilities by those entities. And then there are private prisons, which are funded privately. None of these entities appear to me to have publicly available budget numbers.

2. The Research & Statistics section of the PDOC has links to annual reports and budget documents that might prove helpful. I started looking through them, but didn't find any breakdowns at the level you're looking for. You've probably already looked through these, but if not, they're here: http://www.cor.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/research___statistics/10669

3. You might contact the folks at Solitary Watch and see if they can better direct you. They're an activist group that would likely have a better understanding of funding streams for solitary confinement than I do: http://solitarywatch.com/about/

I wish I had a better answer for you! But hopefully you can find some better information by pursuing one of these routes.

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